r/AskAcademia

I am a freshly graduated PhD and just got the oral offer of a TT faculty in a good public R1 university in the US. It is a great opportunity for me and I really liked the place, the campus and the program.

My husband is an assistant teaching professor in math in a lower rank R1 school right now. I asked the department chair for dual career positions (I am thinking an instructor position will be good enough for us, my husband did not have a postdoc so I understand a TT position will be hard). The department head said he will try but budget cut is really hard now. Could you please share any tips and what should I say to negotiate dual career positions like this situation? Two body problem is our priority and I am willing to sacrifice my salary of start up money for this.

Curious on the thoughts of those in the academic world in regard to the student loan caps that are set to begin in July of this year. Also hope to shed some light on the issues facing medical students. I agree the cost of higher ed in the US is out of control and student loans are a massive issue because of the ease for late teens/early adults to go over a quarter million dollars in debt (The argument of students attending astronomically priced liberal arts schools for undergraduate degrees with no career path is valid but a topic for another post), but this seems like a “solution” that is going to create or further exacerbate problems.

The new caps on federal loans heavily impact medical students and pose concerns in a time of a nationwide physician shortage. The “Big Beautiful Bill” placed a $50,000 yearly cap and $275,000 lifetime cap for professional students. Let’s take a public medical school that is considered decent but not elite and break costs down:

University of Utah Spencer Fox Eccles SOM

-Tier 2 for both Research and Primary Care (US News rankings 2026)
-$52,257 in-state tuition and fees, $94,987 out-of-state tuition and fees

If you happen to get accepted as an out of state student, there will be $44,987 left over for you to figure out how to cover.

“Go somewhere else then”
-Medical school is extremely difficult to get in to with the average school only accepting ~4% of applicants with some schools such as GWU and Yale accepting ~1%. Only 42.9% of applicants received an acceptance in the 2025 cycle. If you do get in to med school, you go wherever you can go, sometimes that means your only option is an out-of state school.

“If you can’t afford it, pick a different career path”
-okay but the same people who are so quick to say something along those lines are also the ones who complain the loudest about how long it takes to get in to see their doctor, let alone a specialist.

“But you’ll make a ton of money right out of graduation”
-Wrong. As a first year resident (PGY1), the average salary is $68,166. The ACGME restricts the amount of hours a resident can work to 80 hours a week averaged over four weeks. Say a resident hits this cap every week (not uncommon for programs such as neurosurgery, internal medicine etc.);

80 hours x 52 weeks =4160 hours a year
$68,166/4160 hours =$16.386/hour

** **You make more money per hour working at Target.

People don’t go in to medicine on a whim. It takes years of preparation and significant costs just to apply alone.

Yes, eventually salary compensation is quite high but not until someone has gone through typically 12+years of higher education and training.

Working during medical school is extremely rare with some schools even prohibiting it or placing restrictions such as limiting to 20 hours per week and only allowing employment during preclinical years (1+2 for trad. 4 year school). For those unaware, both federal and private loans accrue interest while in medical school and are capitalized upon after graduation.

There is this concept that placing a cap will require schools to lower their tuition, yet the amount of private (often predatory) third-party loan services has only increased in response. Private loans are not eligible for the Public Student Loan forgiveness plan and rarely do they have any form of loan forgiveness comparable to federal loans.

So, the question is, in what way does this cap benefit medical students? And will this impact the type and number of students who ultimately decide to go into medicine?

hello! i am writing a story with a scene set at a physics research conference but never been to one. i want it to feel as realistic as possible w/o being movie-ish. one of my characters is a researcher presenting there, and the other is his partner who’s not in the field.

imd really appreciate help with details like these:

* what is the atmosphere like
* how do researchers interact socially
* what presenting/research discussions are like
* conference etiquette/culture
* what are some things that immediately feel inaccurate in fiction

i also need help deciding which physics field for my character to specialize in. i’m thinking partical physics? the scene is meant to be fairly grounded and not exaggerated sci-fi. even small details or personal experiences would help a ton.

thank you so much.

India used to be infamous for an insanely stressful and hard education system, so they recently plan on making it easier and make it more in line with Europe. How do academics feel about that?

Hello!

High school student here. I am going to be helping out with research at a lab this summer at a local college. My current dilemma is that I need access to research papers but most of them require me to sign in with an institution. Well then how can other people outside of universities even conduct their own research? Why do you have to be part of an institution? These are all things I'm wondering. If someone has the time, it would be great if I could have an explanation and/or advice.

Thank you for your time!

Like what should kids be reading? Novels? Do reading newspaper and magazines work? How about online blogs? Isn’t reading Reddit also a form of reading?

To my understanding, it's technically possible for anyone to publish a peer-reviewed paper. But does anyone know of actual examples of that happening? Has anyone in this sub done it themselves? Asking mostly out of curiosity as I don't have nor ever see myself having the financial means to pursue a MA/PhD, and while I doubt my research is publishable by any means, I'd like to at least be realistically informed on the topic.

Edit: Thanks everyone for your replies. I guess as additional information for anyone who reads this later, I'm interested in humanities, not STEM or anything that needs lab access. Appreciate any and all responses, however.

I know it's always better to discuss concerns with professors in person, but I just couldn't find the courage to get up and approach mine. I've dealt with debilitating social anxiety for almost 4 years now, and any time there's a presentation, I'd do everything in my power to avoid it, it's like I'm too stubbornly anxious. I don't normally reach out to professors since I always feel too embarrassed to, like I'm going to sound like an idiot at this level of education.

So, how have you dealt with students like me? Is it inappropriate to ask about opting out of presentations or to do an alternative because of anxiety? How soon would you want to hear from that student? Is it weird? Is it an easy ask? I already have a draft email written up, but I'm terrified to submit it, what if I just sound dumb?

People say organic chemistry is a weeder class designed to fail less intelligent students, so what can I do to get an A?

For example, if I write "Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë is about an orphan who does so and so until she ends up in X", like a really brief, 3 line max, summary of the entire novel, do I still have to add (Brontë, 1847)?

I am explicitly naming the author and have already mentioned the publication year in a previous paragraph, and since I'm covering the whole book it makes no sense to put in the page numbers, so I don't know if the reference is needed.

If it makes any difference, my uni uses the Harvard system.

I am final year PhD student in a lab which I used to think was very social and welcoming lab till recently.

The lab is decent size (10-15 people) with all international students and researchers. We used to do after work drinks, birthday parties and so on. So basically my impression was we were close friends, till recently. I used to reach out when someone was not doing well mentally.

Last few months was really hard on me as I was navigating through the whats coming after PhD and was burned out. I was quiet and didn’t interacted much with people in the lab even when we were hanging out and started mostly working from home. What surprised me was no one ever checked on me. “Hey you seem down, everything okay?” or “How are you doing?”

Fast forward now, I am doing better with the support from my partner, I do workout and do mindful activities.

I started to hangout more with labmates and I started to realize, I do not have the “friendship vibe“ with them now.

I started to see that the labmates were more of colleagues than friends.

Has anyone felt similar feelings?

I’m a first-year engineering technology student at a Canadian university and I’m looking for advice on how to handle a possible academic integrity issue.

During my final exam, near the end, a professor moved me because he thought I was talking to the student beside me. I deny that I was communicating with anyone. I sometimes quietly read/mutter questions to myself when I’m working, and I believe that may have been misunderstood. An incident form was filed.

After grades came out, I received an F on the final exam/course. Before the final, I was passing and I believe I only needed around 35–40% on the exam to pass the course. I attempted most of the exam and expected at least some partial marks, so the F confused me.

I emailed the professor multiple times asking whether I failed because of the incident or because of my actual exam performance. I did not get a response for about 2–3 weeks. I also emailed other people in the department/chair’s office asking for help. After that, the professor finally replied saying he wanted to meet with me “regarding my final exam.” I had also requested to look at/review my exam, so I thought the meeting was going to be an exam review.

At the meeting, he asked me to explain a specific part of my solution from the exam. I couldn’t explain it clearly because the exam was about a month ago, I was not told beforehand that I would have to explain or defend a specific solution, and I had not been reviewing that material daily (I'm no smart student as this is the hardest course imo). He questioned how I could forget the math/electricity concepts. My issue is not that I forgot the whole course, but that I could not remember the exact reasoning behind a specific exam solution after several weeks.

He said my method was unusual compared with other students and that other professors had looked at it. He also said that only Gemini could come up with something like my solution. I found this concerning because I did not use AI or cheat during the exam. Also, there was a TA/invigilator behind me during the exam, so I do not understand how I could have used AI or outside help in the exam room.

He also said I have until Friday to write an explanation of how I solved that question, and if he is not satisfied, he may send it forward as an academic dishonesty issue. Another issue is that he only gave me a small piece of my written work to use for the explanation — basically one equation/formula. He did not give me the full exam question, the circuit diagram, or the full context of my answer. The question was a nodal analysis circuit problem, so the diagram and values matter a lot. Without the full circuit, I do not know how I am supposed to accurately explain where every term in the equation came from. I’m worried that if I try to reconstruct the explanation from only a small equation, it could accidentally look inconsistent even though I did not cheat.

I did not cheat. I’m worried because I genuinely don’t remember the exact steps I used during the exam, and I don’t want to accidentally write something that doesn’t match my exam work perfectly. I can explain the general method I think I was using, but not every exact step from memory.

How should I write my response? Is it reasonable to say that I cannot honestly reproduce the exact solution after a month, but I can explain the general approach I believe I used? Is it reasonable to ask for the full question/circuit diagram and my full written answer before submitting the explanation? How can I properly explain a nodal analysis equation if I was only given a small piece of the equation and not the full circuit? Should I contact the university ombuds/student advocacy office before submitting anything?

Also, is it normal for a professor to ask for my tutor’s contact information in this situation? I mentioned I had a tutor, and the professor asked for the tutor’s contact info. I’m not sure whether I should provide that directly or only through the official academic integrity process.

Any advice from professors, academic staff, or students who have dealt with this kind of process would be appreciated.

Hello all!

I am about to graduate with my undergrad degree and for the longest time I was trying to apply for follow on study at graduate school.

However, I heard a few days ago that I was not accepted into any of my desired programs—so I will not be going to graduate school at all next academic year.

That being said, I received numerous scholarships both while I was waiting for an admission decision and after I found out. Obviously I can’t use them, but I’m wondering if I can still say I was a recipient. I’ve also heard people saying that they advertise they won a scholarship, but couldn’t accept because of blank reason.

I did put a lot of work into these scholarships and it would be a real shame if I couldn’t say anything about them.

I appreciate any advice you’d have! Thank you!

I'm not an academic myself, but I follow nutrition science as an interested layperson (based in Europe/Germany).

I'm posting this here because I genuinely don't know where else to take it, and I'd appreciate input from people who know more about publication ethics than I do.

I came across a narrative review that was published in February 2026 in the MDPI journal Dietetics – "The Case for Establishing Choline Intake Recommendations Throughout Europe—A Narrative Review on the Importance of Choline for the European Population"

(DOI: 10.3390/dietetics5010012).

The COI statement says the authors declare no conflicts of interest.

One of the authors is Nikolaus Rittenau. He's listed publicly as managing director of Watson Nutrition / Beyond Food GmbH. Watson Nutrition sells choline supplements. Like, specifically choline – choline capsules, choline powder, citicoline. That's the thing the paper is about.

Now, I want to be careful here, because I'm not trying to say the paper is wrong or should be retracted or whatever. Choline probably is underappreciated in European nutrition policy, I genuinely don't know enough to judge the science. But that's sort of the point – readers should be able to judge it themselves, with full information. And the paper isn't a neutral "here is what we know about choline" overview. It argues that intake is underestimated, singles out vegan and plant-based diets as a particular risk, and calls on European nutrition societies to revise their recommendations upward in some cases. There's also video content around the paper where Rittenau explicitly frames this as a public-health problem that institutions like the DGE are failing to address.

I kept thinking: if a pharma-industry employee published a narrative review calling for wider prescribing of a drug their company makes, would "no conflicts of interest" fly? I don't think it would.

The narrative review part matters too, I think. It's not a systematic review with a registered protocol. There's judgment involved in which studies you emphasize, how you interpret the evidence. That's not a criticism of the format – but it does make the question of whose judgment we're trusting more relevant.

So I guess my actual questions are:

1. Is this the kind of commercial relationship that should normally be disclosed, even if the author didn't directly profit from this specific paper? My instinct is yes, but maybe I'm missing something.
2. Is contacting the journal the right first step, or does that rarely go anywhere with MDPI?
3. If the journal doesn't respond or dismisses it – what then? COPE? The author's institution? Both?
4. And if a COI was genuinely missed, what's the usual fix – a corrigendum, an editorial note, something else?

Sorry for the long post. I've been sitting on this for a few days and wasn't sure whether I was overreacting.

I’m an early-career mathematician currently based in North America and I recently received a tenure-track offer from a university in my home country. The offer itself is very reasonable and I really liked the department on my campus visit.

My spouse is also a mathematician, and while we currently work in different countries anyway, accepting this position would basically mean deciding where we try to build a more permanent long-term life. So naturally, whether there are realistic academic opportunities for him matters a lot in the decision.

After receiving the written offer, I raised the possibility of dual-career considerations with the Assistant Provost for Faculty Affairs. The response I received was something like: “ no restrictions regarding family members applying for positions at the university. But all candidates are required to apply through the regular recruitment process for any available openings.”

The response is fair and institutionally understandable, but also not especially reassuring when trying to make a permanent relocation decision.

Obviously, I didn't want to talk about this dual hire until I have a written offer because I didn't even know if it was going to be a good offer (financial compensations aren't put into ads in my home country) but maybe bringing this up with assistant provost wasn't a good idea? Should I contact the chair of the department?

My spouse had actually applied to the same position I eventually received the offer for, although I was the candidate selected to move forward in the later stages. At the same time, I don’t know how much to read into that because his area is pure math while the department’s current openings more for statistics/data science teaching needs. But also given the department has openings, the issue wouldn't be funding but more of a fit.

I have been told on the campus visit that the department has been consistently understaffed and they've been struggling to get good candidates for the positions open in maths. And that previous searches for the position I got selected for had failed for long time.

So now I don’t know what to do. The response I got seemed like the university isn't willing to even consider a temporary position as a start, which is something my partner may consider.

But I also don't know if I am maybe discussing this with the wrong person.

For people who have dealt with academic two-body problems, especially internationally: how much uncertainty is “normal” here?

Hey everyone, I’m a B.Sc. Forensic Science student and currently working on my dissertation project. I honestly need some genuine guidance because this is my first major research project and I don’t want it to look copied or fully AI-written.

My topic is:

Detection of Latent Fingerprint Using Dragonfruit Peels on Porous and Non-Porous Surfaces 🔍🍉

I have to prepare a complete dissertation in university format with:

\- Introduction

\- Literature review

\- Methodology

\- Results & discussion

\- References

\- Tables/images/graphs

I already have a basic draft and some format samples, but I’m struggling with:

\- making the writing sound natural and student-written

\- improving grammar without making it robotic

\- reducing AI-style wording

\- making methodology/results look realistic

\- proper forensic dissertation formatting

If anyone has experience with forensic science projects, dissertation writing, or knows good tools/websites for making research writing more human and natural, please help 🙏

Even small guidance about:

\- better writing style

\- paraphrasing techniques

\- realistic formatting

\- references/journals

\- tools for humanizing academic writing

would really help me a lot ❤️

I just finished my masters degree last year and my paper was accepted at an academic conference. I am presenting this weekend. I've never done this before so I don't know what is reasonable or professional for me to expect.

My 2 main questions:

Should I expect that I will have access to a screen? In other words should I be making a PowerPoint for my 15 minute presentation? I have asked the people who let me know my paper was accepted, and have gotten no response from them. (For context, there are three or four of us presenting on similar topics and then there will be a panel discussion afterwards.)

Is it completely unreasonable to expect that you have the schedule for a conference within, I don't know, a week of the event? I just realized I can only cancel my registration for this weekend's event 7 days or more in advance.. but we are now two days away and I don't have the schedule. As I am trying to arrange transportation and coverage, it seems a little unreasonable to me but I don't know if this is just typical. Aside from knowing what time I present on saturday, I have zero information about this conference's schedule of events. There is no information online.

(I used to be an administrative assistant who assisted phds in booking and getting reimbursed for their academic conferences... in the STEM world that I was a part of, there was always an abundance of information well in advance to be able to justify and support attending conferences. I now work in the humanities and it's just blowing my mind that this lack of information could be acceptable.)

Hello everyone! I am considering doing a PhD in history, and more specifically in the field of Ottoman/Balkans studies with a focus on nineteenth century transnational history.

I would be really grateful if you could suggest universities for PhD programmes in history (or say why you wouldn't recommend some). For now, I am mostly considering the EUI and the CEU even though the latter seems to be disliked by its students (at least on reddit). (In general, I would like to be at a uni in continental Europe.)

A bit of context: I did my BA in the UK in History, Politics and Classics, I'm currently doing my MA in European Politics and Society at Leiden, Jagiellonian and Charles University. Although my current degree is more politics-oriented, I will do my thesis on a history-related topic and hopefully I would be able to develop it further as a PhD project.

Please, please, please share any suggestions, tips, or recommendations you might have!

Thanks!

I submitted a manuscript to Journal 1 and it stayed in “submission” for about a month with no response. I contacted the editor multiple times through email, WhatsApp, and the OJS message system but received no reply.

Because of the prolonged silence, I submitted a withdrawal request through OJS. About an hour later, I submitted the manuscript to Journal 2.

The next day, Journal 1 unexpectedly changed the status to “under review.” Journal 2 is also now under review, so technically there is simultaneous submission.

Since then, I have continued trying to contact Journal 1 (email, WhatsApp, OJS messages) to confirm withdrawal, but still no response.

I’m trying to resolve this transparently and in good faith. How serious is this situation realistically? Has anyone dealt with something similar?